The present invention relates generally to the field of systems for and methods of processing purchase orders. More particularly, the present invention relates to systems for and methods of applying rules to accept or reject the purchase orders.
One particular business that processes purchase orders is the retail business. Operations for a business often include purchasing merchandise from a supplier for sale to customers or for use in the processes and products for the business. Generally, purchasing merchandise or supplies from the supplier involves sending a purchase order to the supplier requesting a specific number of items for a specific price. The number of items multiplied by the price of the items provides a total cost associated with the purchase order. Prior to sending the purchase order, the purchase order may need to be approved by an entity, such as a budgeting department. The entity may apply one or more rules, or checks, to the purchase order in determining whether to approve the purchase order. For example, a rule may dictate that the approval is granted or denied based on whether incurring the total cost of the purchase order is acceptable in view of budget constraints. Accordingly, the purchase order is approved or rejected based on budget constraints prior to being sent to the supplier.
The rules that are applied to the electronic purchase order may be any of a plurality of types of rules. For example, the rule may be a budgeting rule. Budget rules describe the amount of money available to purchase merchandise for a given time period. During a pre-season planning and buying phase, the budget rules may be used by planners and buyers for the retail business to control their purchasing budget. During a seasonal phase, the budget rules may be utilized in calculating performance as the budget rules are updated based on retail activity. For example, planners and buyers may monitor the updated budget rules to determine if each category's performance is proceeding according to plan or if corrective steps, such as price reductions or stopped orders, need to be taken to manage inventory.
The retail business can require that certain purchase orders be processed in a very short amount of time, while other purchase orders must be placed in advance of the desired delivery. For example, changes in current trends in the fashion industry may require that inventory be increased on short notice. Additionally, fashion articles may require ordering well in advance of delivery, in some cases six months or more in advance. For certain aspects of the fashion industry, items may be required to be ordered one or more seasons in advance. An advantageous purchase order system must accommodate this variation in lead times of the ordered items without unnecessarily tying up funds.
Thus, there is a need for a system and method for processing electronic purchase orders based on the application of one or more rules. There is a further need for such a system and method configured to automatically modify the rules based on a qualifying event. There is yet further a need for such a system and method configured to provide a user with an option to modify an electronic purchase order that was rejected based on the application of the one or more rules. Even further, there is a need for an automated system and method that automatically approves or rejects a purchase order after performing an open-to-buy function.